As Bait

"Splish splash~ Whoosh—"

The little fish swimming through the bloody water seemed to have been injected with stimulants, darting wildly about at more than double their usual speed!

As the blood entered their bodies, unseen genetic mutations occurred. Their eyes began turning blood-red, teeth erupted wildly from their lower jaws, and even their dorsal fins changed in ways that made one's scalp tingle.

Witnessing a scene like species evolution unfold in such a short time was truly soul-shaking!

"Th-this..." Though Hirono Toda's vision was rather blurry, he could still sense the mutations. His expression was stunned. "This is even more freakish than those Dead Bodies! Humans only improve in various aspects at most... but these things have even changed in appearance and size!"

"This isn't scientific! How could that devil ray's blood possibly contain enough energy to support the fish's transformation?!"

"Teacher Shizuka, get the car ready. We're leaving right away!" Upon hearing Kurumi's words, Shizuka Marikawa immediately started the ignition. After the vehicle shuddered for a moment, the engine began to roar.

Busujima Saeko grabbed the arm Kurumi held out, lightly kicked off the side of the vehicle, and flipped onto the roof. The veteran driver in the cab moved as though she and the car were one, immediately slamming down on the accelerator and charging toward the shore!

In the bloody water nearby, the fish no longer chased one another. Instead, they accelerated toward the modified Hummer.

Hirono Toda grinned at the sight. "What are they doing? Even that big one couldn't handle this car. Are they coming to test their teeth?"

Kurumi glanced at him. "I don't know whether they want to test their teeth, but I do know they could bite through the tires with ease."

"Komuro, keep loading ammunition."

The moment he heard that, Komuro Takashi, inside the cabin, saw an empty magazine fly in through the sunroof and smack him squarely in the face with remarkable accuracy.

"Urgh!" He let out a muffled groan from the blow, then hurriedly caught the magazine and began pressing rounds into it one by one. After all, he could still tell what was important and what was not.

Click—

The bolt was set again. Sweeping his gaze over the bloodwater, which showed no movement, Hirono Toda began firing at the mutated fish darting joyfully through the middle of the river.

Bang bang bang!

Hirono Toda missed two out of three shots. That was clearly unreasonable for him—wasn't the stunned look on his face proof enough?

The fish seemed intelligent. When you fired at them, they actually knew to accelerate and whip their tails to flee!

Bang!

Another sniper round slammed viciously into a mutated fish, striking its head, passing through its tail, and shooting straight toward the riverbed! Only a burst of blood bloomed in the water, but the nearby fish soon devoured it all.

They... seemed to have grown a little stronger. Kurumi, lying atop the roof, held her breath and focused. Every bullet she fired blew apart one mutated fish, sometimes even two. Beside her, Hirono Toda quickly found his rhythm as well and began properly hunting the school!

Fortunately, there were only a few dozen fish in the river. By the time the two of them were nearly due for another magazine change, they had killed almost all of them.

Compared to the Mutated Devil Ray from before, these things were indeed much easier to handle.

They had never come within five meters of the vehicle, leaving only bursts of blood in the water that were quickly washed away and dispersed by the current, leaving no trace behind.

Hirono Toda plopped down onto the roof. He certainly had a talent for shooting, but firing at fish in the water from a constantly swaying vehicle was still extremely draining for him.

Besides, the glasses were not even his own! They made everything look terribly blurry! Yet managing to hit two targets out of every three shots was no easy feat. This was already an exceptional performance for him.

Looking at Kurumi beside him, who seemed utterly unaffected, he lowered his head to someone else for the first time in the field of marksmanship...

As the blood in the river gradually faded, Busujima Saeko's expression grew increasingly grave. "Kurumi, do you think the blood from the Dead Bodies we killed yesterday flowed into the river and caused this..."

Before Kurumi could answer, Takagi Saya poked her head out through the sunroof and hurriedly gave her opinion. "It definitely did! Since those Dead Bodies can infect humans by biting them, what exactly are they relying on?"

"Without a doubt, bodily fluids! Their saliva must contain large amounts of pathogens. When they bite someone, they transmit them into that person's wound, causing rapid mutation!"

She instinctively adjusted the glasses on her nose, only to feel nothing, and awkwardly coughed twice. "Since even saliva can carry viral factors, their blood must naturally be a gathering place for the virus!"

"It could even be said that blood is far more terrifying in terms of transmission... As for why some people turn into Dead Bodies quickly while others take a long time, it should be due to antibodies. People with stronger physiques can hold out longer."

"And the reason we haven't been infected is because our skin blocks the virus from entering. But once it finds a wound..."

"Of course, that doesn't do much good... We'll all become Dead Bodies eventually, unless..."

"Unless someone can withstand infection without mutating." Hearing that familiar, charming voice, Takagi Saya looked up at Kurumi and happened to meet those wine-red eyes brimming with amusement.

Isn't that just like Alice from Resident Evil? As for the serum... who the hell knows what it's made from... As Kurumi listened to Takagi Saya's analysis, she recalled the so-called "serum" in her mind.

If there really are people in this world who can resist infection... then once they successfully create a serum, will humanity undergo evolution?

If the Dead Body virus is truly this widespread, no one knows what this Earth will become. Oh, no—perhaps the Main God does. By building all kinds of computational models, it should be able to determine the answer closest to reality.

"We're almost across the river~" Shizuka Marikawa in the driver's seat reminded everyone.

Boom!~

The modified Hummer's tremendous power was fully unleashed. Even carrying so many people, it was not affected in the slightest. It climbed a slope of nearly seventy degrees with ease, and because its power was so excessive, the vehicle even briefly went airborne as it reached the bank.

Hirono Toda looked around through his binoculars, checking the surroundings for Dead Bodies, but the riverside was silent in the early morning. Aside from them, there seemed to be nothing else...

The modified Hummer received a free wash in the river, rinsing away all the blood left from crashing into Dead Bodies the night before.

But when Komuro Takashi and the others stepped out and saw the dents on both sides of the vehicle, they still could not help sucking in cold breaths.

Such thick steel plating had been smashed into this state. There had been signs of protrusions from inside the cabin, but it was nowhere near as shocking as seeing it from the outside!

"Huh? Tokisaki Senpai, watch out!"

After scanning the area with his binoculars, Hirono Toda looked back toward the river and happened to see that enormous figure lunging at them again! Its shadow fell over Kurumi, who stood by the riverbank!

Kurumi had always suspected that the Mutated Devil Ray was not dead. At most, it had only been severely wounded. It was not until the vehicle reached the shore that she discovered it had circled back from the other side. A faint trail of blood on the river's surface had ultimately exposed it...

The Mutated Devil Ray thought it had hidden well, yet it had remained under Kurumi's watch the entire time.

It was badly injured, yet instead of finding somewhere to rest, it insisted on making trouble. Kurumi had thought there would be no kill reward, but an idea immediately came to mind.

She would use herself as bait and kill this severely wounded Mutated Devil Ray!